First things first, this is a review of the 2021 The Suicide Squad. Meaning (and the easiest way to differentiate the two in my opinion) James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad, not 2016’s Suicide Squad.

James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad not only adds a word to the title, it adds everything the 2016 blunder was missing. 2016’s Suicide Squad was a boring, uninspired super hero movie. It tried too hard to be gritty and real (like every DC movie has tried to do since Nolan’s Batman trilogy). It completely missed the spirit of what the comic book The Suicide Squad was all about. This is a story of C-list superheroes being used by the government to run suicide missions. The main characters are supposed to be shitty heroes, because they are shitty villains in the first place. That’s the whole point. The government does not care about these heroes, because nobody is supposed to care about them. They are fodder thrown into horrible missions just for a ten percent chance at success. I love the premise! But 2016’s Suicide Squad just tries a little too hard to be serious… If that makes sense. James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad, on the other hand, perfectly captures this feeling. The opening scene is two teams storming a beach. One team is comprised of heroes that are essentially lambs sent to slaughter. They cause a distraction while the other team are afforded the chance to get their feet under them at all. This leads to a wonderful opening to the movie where one of the characters dies within the very first minute of their mission. This is exactly what it should be. A bunch of shitty heroes being led to slaughter. It’s handled perfectly and made me laugh out loud in the theater. I’m trying not to name too many characters in this review because it sort of leads to spoilers. But there are some serious left-field heroes thrown in. Characters that have absolutely no right being anywhere in a major motion picture. It’s wonderful and hilarious. But… I have to give shout outs to one specific character (and one actor, but that comes later), and that is John Cena as Peace Maker. Peace Maker is such an obscure superhero with a ridiculous background. In the comics, he is a character that is so dedicated to being a pacifist that he will resort to extreme violence to achieve it. This is later shown to be a mental issue where his father (a Nazi camp leader) abused him as a child. But in James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad, Peace Maker is sort of stripped of this heavy feeling and is just a man that loves peace so much that he will resort to violence to get it. The overall idea is the same with the character and it’s done wonderfully. He just does not seem to see the irony in his actions. I love him so much and will be watching the HBO series dedicated to this character. For me, he truly steals the show. A wonderful and hilarious character all around and John Cena could not be more perfectly cast.

Now for the actor that deserves a major shoutout: Margot Robbie. I think it is undeniable that she carried 2016’s Suicide Squad. She really had a pretty awful script to go off of and somehow made a perfect representation of the character Harley Quinn. She was perfectly cast in that role. She was honestly the sole reason to watch that movie. But now, there is no reason to watch that movie at all because she reprises her role as Harley Quinn in this movie! And she nails it once more. I think there is no better actor to portray Harley Quinn and I’m oh so happy that Margot returns in this movie.

Which brings me to my main point; The Suicide Squad is not a sequel, remake, or reboot, it is a complete restart. It essentially wipes the slate clean and gives the series a brand new start. Essentially, it’s time to wipe Suicide Squad from those memory banks. Because we’re just going to try again. And what a new start we have. What a genius move of DC to give the keys to James Gunn. He truly made this movie everything it needed to be. And everything I wanted it to be. There are very very few DC films I like. Honestly just the Nolan Batman trilogy and Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker. But, The Suicide Squad might be one of my favorite superhero movies ever made. I truly love this film and I hope they can use this movie to spark new life in the DC universe. It desperately needs it.

I give James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad a 3 out of 4. It is the perfect balance of over-the-top antics mixed with ridiculous heroes. It is hilarious and perfectly paced. I do love James Gunn and I cannot believe that he was able to salvage the dying body of the DC universe. It’s wonderfully cast and wonderfully played. There is a ton of violence and amazing situations in the movie. It honestly just plays perfectly. 2016’s Suicide Squad died before it ever began by restricting itself to a PG-13 rating. The Suicide Squad, however, let’s its freak flag fly and earns that well-deserved R-rating. I love making more superhero movies R-rated. It just blends so perfectly. I wish all of them would ditch the PG-13. But this one especially. I love this movie, please go watch it.